‘Real deal’ Kvitova has talent to dominate

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The season-ending WTA championships had many story lines. Could Maria Sharapova recover from her ankle injury to threaten at the year-end championships and become world number one again? Would one of the new major winners lift the trophy? Could Caroline Wozniacki continue her reign as world number one for a second straight year and win the end of season championships for the first time?

This is the first time the end of season championships have been held in Istanbul, Turkey. The crowds have been packed all week so it was an excellent choice of city. The stadium looked great and so did the green tennis court with the purple outer court. The tennis throughout was brilliant.

Unfortunately for Sharapova she had to pull out after her second round robin match against Li Na, thus ending her challenge of becoming world number one. This meant Wozniacki ended up finishing as world number one for the second year running without winning a major and having only won one match at the season-ending championships.

The good news for the event was the brilliant play of the major winners in these championships. Petra Kvitova, Li and Samantha Stosur all played well.

Kvitova is the real deal and has been unstoppable indoors this season. She ended up making the semi-finals by going undefeated in her group. In the semi-finals she played Stosur who beat Li in her last round robin match to qualify for the semi-finals. This was the match of the tournament with Stosur leading a set and a break before Kvitova rallied to win in three sets and make her first ever WTA championships final.

In the other semi-final it was Vera Zvonareva versus Victoria Azarenka. Azarenka dominated Zvonareva to make the finals.

Kvitova was the favourite to win and beat Azarenka in three sets to win her first ever WTA Championship. It has been an incredible year for Kvitova rising from outside the top 30 to finish the season at world number two.

She has all the talent in the world and at 21 years old can dominate women’s tennis. She has already won her first major this year at Wimbledon and we can expect many more. She has a big game, with a massive serve, great groundstrokes, and being a leftie only helps.

Next year she will be the new world number one and hopefully stay there if she can improve her fitness and feel comfortable being number one. We need a number one that consistently wins majors and hopefully it can be Kvitova.

And more. She can hit any shot in the tennis book from ANYWHERE and proved this week that she has a plan B and a plan C. She’s tough at the business end of sets and especially at the end of the match. With a little maturity and experience, she will be unbeatable a lot of the time. She may well be the finest ball striker whom we’ve ever seen on the women’s side. At Wimbledon, her groundies were on the average 5mph speedier than those of Nadal and Djokovic. Hers is preternatural talent. Perhaps the other girls should concede and got to the movies, the beach or the mountains instead of facing a tough course called Demolition 101. Lol.

Kvitova has terrific touch as well. She can hit any shot from anywhere on the court. She is still learning and maturing. This is portentious for the other girls, who are going to have to work even harder as a result. Kvitova is a nice, honest person too. That matters in today’s amoral pragmatic world. Pragmatism is wishful thinking and there is none of that in Petra. Go girl!!!!

Good article and I agree with most of it. The only disagreement is to the fitness part of it. Stosur is pretty fit, so is Azarenka and other players. They are not as great as Kvitova, not even close. Stosur has been fit most of her career and only this year won a Grand Slam and much with the help of Serena Williams. She doesn’t need to improve in that department at all, she has a great body, Kvitova, and a huge talent to play tennis! Absolutely love to watch her play! Go Petra!

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Greg is one of the UK’s best known and most liked tennis players. After a hugely successful playing career that included reaching the 1997 US Open final and a career high world ranking of number 4, Greg has gone on to forge a media career, commentating on tennis events for the BBC, Eurosport and Sky Sports. Greg continues to compete on the ATP Champions Tour while fulfilling his role as an LTA ambassador. He is happily married and lives in London with his wife and two children. The views expressed are his own.